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Author
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Comment
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aznsweetie
Registered
User
(9/29/05 12:59 pm)
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Racism in Disney Films
I happened to come across several interesting discussions on this board about Disney and their portrayals of fairytales. I'm doing a huge research paper on Prejudice and Racism in Disney films, and am just looking for anything from personal interpretations to sources I could incorporate. Any input would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
Jen
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DerekJ
Unregistered User
(9/29/05 2:02 pm)
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Re: Racism in Disney Films
Let's see, someone at a college got upset about:
A) the Indians in Peter Pan,
B) Song of the South, and/or
C) decided to take another bash at Cinderella.
So, to start with the standard basic litany:
A) They're not
real
Indians, they're childrens' wishful Neverland conceptions of Indians,
B) They're not slaves, they're Reconstruction sharecroppers, and James Baskett was hired for his popular "Amos & Andy" shticks on the cartoon voices,
and
C)...Oh, don't even START.
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Helen
J Pilinovsky
Registered
User
(9/29/05 2:23 pm)
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Re: Racism in Disney Films
Please, do! This is a great topic. In the broad portrayal of racial issues, a lot of work has been done on "attractiveness" and the caucasian standards of beauty portrayed in Disney films, even those drawn from other cultural backgrounds (I know that Marina Warner addresses this in
From the Beast to the Blonde, though I can't think of any other critics off the top of my head). That might work as a starting point ...
Could you tell us a bit more, specifically, which aspects of race in Disney movies you're thinking of? The decision to give Sebastian the crab a Carribean accent, Disney's attempts to rectify their positioning by introducing a more diverse cast of characters using "Aladdin", "Pocohontas", "Mulan", etc., etc.?
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Veronica
Schanoes
Registered
User
(9/29/05 3:09 pm)
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Re: Racism in Disney Films
I think we have a thread in the archives about racism in Disney films, don't we?
I'd look at the crows in Dumbo as well, and I must disagree with DerekJ. While I understand that the Indians in Peter Pan are white kids' imaginings of Indians, I think that's a pretty fine piece of hair-splitting when it comes down to the mass power of Disney to influence kids' ideas, and that is, in fact, practically the definition of racist stereotypes and representations, that they are representations of what the ruling racial group thinks about the subordinated one. It's also interesting because the Disney representation of the Indians is radically different, I think, than Barrie's representation, so it is an example of Disney doing it all by its little self. I can't think of any racism in Cinderella off the top of my head; I suppose one could note that Cinderella, as the only blonde in the entire kingdom is of course the most beautiful, but that seems to me to be collaterally racist, as there are plenty of brunette white girls.
You could look at the way the Nazis excoriated Mickey Mouse as an attempt to corrupt Aryan youth, as, according to them, mice are vermin that every right-thinking Aryan should loathe, like Jews are, and Mickey Mouse is an example of the degeneracy of the Jew-loving US. On the other hand, that's less about racism in Disney than it is about racists' use of Disney.
Edited by: Veronica Schanoes
at: 9/29/05 3:16 pm
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DerekJ
Unregistered User
(9/29/05 4:11 pm)
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Re: Racism in Disney Films
Quote:
I'd look at the crows in Dumbo as well, and I must disagree with DerekJ. While I understand that the Indians in Peter Pan are white kids' imaginings of Indians, I think that's a pretty fine piece of hair-splitting when it comes down to the mass power of Disney to influence kids' ideas, and that is, in fact, practically the definition of racist stereotypes and representations, that they are representations of what the ruling racial group thinks about the subordinated one.
But if we're crusading against "bad" racism, the Dumbo crows hardly qualify--
Yes, they're the prevailing Harlem-Renaissance Cotton Club stereotypes of 1940, but this being a Disney film, we don't see them drinking or throwing dice...In fact, they're rather
good
characters, and smarter and more helpful than our main protagonists, in the end.
Quote:
It's also interesting because the Disney representation of the Indians is radically different, I think, than Barrie's representation, so it is an example of Disney doing it all by its little self.
(Not, of course, that Barrie was particularly enlightened in his day--
"The Pickaninny tribe"? "Chief Greatbiglittlepanther"?...Disney had its work cut out for it just softening it down to a song number and a handful of story-gags for the kids.)
Quote:
I can't think of any racism in Cinderella off the top of my head; I suppose one could note that Cinderella, as the only blonde in the entire kingdom is of course the most beautiful, but that seems to me to be collaterally racist, as there are plenty of brunette white girls.
Well, no, the topic was "Prejudice
and
Racism", so figured the original poster was trying to leave in enough off-topic wiggle-room for "All princesses poison the minds of young feminists" generica...
Had to make a pre-emptive strike, before we got back into THAT thread again.
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DividedSelf
Registered
User
(9/29/05 4:55 pm)
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Re: Racism in Disney Films
Crisscrossing back to Willy Wonka...
Aside from motivational subplots etc... Am I the only person on God's earth to feel extremely uncomfortable about the Umpalumpas? (In the book as much as the film(s).) No one else seems to have much of a problem with this.
But not Disney, I know, whoops... (One track...)
Re this thread... Is there a specific reason why the Disney/racist connection? Was Disney especially more racist than any of the other studios at the time (at least some of whom were also pretty dreadful)? Or is it something more to do with the different sort of choices an animator makes? Or are we talking about Disney now as well as then?
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Helen
J Pilinovsky
Registered
User
(9/29/05 5:09 pm)
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Re: Racism in Disney Films
"Yes, they're the prevailing Harlem-Renaissance Cotton Club stereotypes of 1940, but this being a Disney film, we don't see them drinking or throwing dice..."
Interesting association there, and a good example of how even a supposedly "non-derogatory" stereotype can be damaging ... the pervasive nature of the racism itself is not actually eliminated, just diluted to a palatable point that makes it more "acceptable" (and more long-lived). The stereotype of the "Mamie" figure, to look at a similar "happy" image of racism, is no less damaging to individuals of the background being flattened for its depiction of supposed contentment then any other racially based set of assumptions ...
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DerekJ
Unregistered User
(9/29/05 6:27 pm)
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Re: Racism in Disney Films
Quote:
Re this thread... Is there a specific reason why the Disney/racist
connection? Was Disney especially more racist than any of the
other studios at the time (at least some of whom were also pretty
dreadful)? Or is it something more to do with the different sort
of choices an animator makes? Or are we talking about Disney now
as well as then?
Quote:
It's Disney Treated As Unregistered Useriversal Social Symbol, usually by those who:
A) associate all fairytales with Disney, as if they
wrote every fairytale in existence (aka the Shrek Factor),
B) want to strike at sacred cows that represent their own "deluded" childhood, and show what progressive iconoclasts they can be now that they're all Grown Up and Mature (you usually find the same bloodthirst coming from history students who drool over Jefferson & Sally Hemmings, which didn't happen, btw),
and
C) still harbor murderous resentment against Michael Eisner, and pile every Walt-era mistake on HIS shoulders, too, since it must have been his fault too somehow. (He's
now, btw, and so are the 90's...Chill.)
All perfect-storming together to reduce Symbolic Disney back to the issue of Evil Corporate Unregistered Useriversal Juggernaut That Cruelly Forced Little Girls At Mass-Saturated Gunpoint to Daydream About Cinderella Marriage When They Were Young, lather, rinse, repeat...
(Now, me, I take Disney at isolated-case face value--
There are on-the-mark Peter Pans and Alices, there are Snow White and Cinderella improvements, and there are Sleeping Beauty and B&tB cases of them seriously dropping the ball...But, as they say, It'
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DerekJ
Unregistered User
(9/29/05 6:29 pm)
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Re: Racism in Disney Films
(Whoops:
Quote:
But, as they say, It's Only A Movie.
...Darn, I wish I had an account that let me edit.) :\
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evil
little pixie
Registered
User
(9/29/05 7:06 pm)
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Re: Racism in Disney Films
At the risk of sounding like a know-it-all, I'd like to add my opinion as a history major:
When looking at a topic like this one, I think it is imperative
to consider social context. For instance, say you decided to focus
on the portrayal of Native Americans in Disney's 'Peter Pan.' The
movie came out in 1953, so you'd have to look at society in 1953.
Specifically, I'd say focus on 1953 social attitudes towards Native
Americans, race, the film industry as a whole, the children's film
industry in particular, the power/influence of the media, how children
think and learn, how adults think and learn, and I'm sure I've forgotten
a few. Of course, then you get into the problem of how there wasn't
one grand representative "1953 Society" but rather a lot
of separate groups divided by age, race, gender, occupation, regional
location, hobbies, religion, education, etc etc etc. So then you
start investigating those subgroups, and that leads you to even
more questions to investigate, and of course by now this process
is way beyond what I think your paper is expected to cover (unless
it's a senior or graduate thesis).;)
So for finding context for your specific paper, and sticking with the 'Peter Pan' example, I'd suggest at least taking a good look at how Disney's 1953 portrayal of Native Americans compares with other 1953 film and possibly other media portrayals of Native Americans, as well as tracking down some 1953 primary sources (newspaper articles, letters or diaries, etc) that tell you some of what some people were saying about it in 1953. Then you can use this context (and whatever other context you have the time/energy/space to look into) to inform and possibly shape your argument.
Of course you probably already thought of these points, but I just wanted to add my two cents. Good luck!
Edited by: evil little pixie at: 9/29/05 7:08 pm
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rosyelf
Registered
User
(9/30/05 2:11 am)
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Racism, etc.
DividedSelf, I have problems with the Umpalumpas, alright ! And I'm disappointed that the makers of the recent Willy Wonka film didn't see fit to edit them out altogether. Though they are clearly stereotyped versions of "brown" people-small, exotic, hardworking, etc-there could be an argument about keeping them in the film IF they were germane to the plot. But I really don't think they are. They emerge every now and then and sing a little song, and that's about it.
That they are in Roald Dahl's book doesn't make them acceptable either. They are one of his less-than-satisfactory creations. Apparently Dahl was challenged on the subject of racism vis a vis the Umpalumpas-this was soon after publication in. . .was it the Seventies ?-and he brushed off the question saying that racism wasn't really an issue in Britain, only in America ! For an educated and in many ways liberal-minded person, that is an extraordinarily crass remark. And a bizarre one-issues of race, racism, immigration and so on have been at the forefront of British society since the Fifties.
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DividedSelf
Registered
User
(9/30/05 4:43 am)
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Re: Racism, etc.
Mightily relieved to hear someone say this...
It's almost as if people don't like to mention it.
Doing an admittedly quick internet search I didn't find any adverse reaction to this.
Strongly suggests how much lack of clarity there still is about these issues.
(Diverted from the thread again, oh dear...)
(
Oompa L
oompas, oops - but what the hell?)
Edited by: DividedSelf at: 9/30/05 7:55 am
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AliceCEB
Registered
User
(9/30/05 8:10 am)
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Re: Racism, etc.
I'm rushing, but I'll try to be coherent. I see a tension between, on the one hand, seeing stories as filled with subtext vs., on the other hand, seeing stories as "just a story", and I think this tension may relate in part to how we use and view stereotypes.
We use stereotypes all the time, in daily conversation and thought. When someone says "So-and-so is quite the yenta," the listener conjures up a vision of a jewish woman who is a busybody. This is a stereotype: a person has been reduced to a set of characteristics, none too flattering. But the shorthand is used in conversation because it describes a pattern of behavior in a person that is recognizable--it happens over and over again. This kind of shorthand is used all the time in storytelling when describing characters--and in fairy tales, where characterization is at a minimum, it helps us place the characters in the story.
But there is a fine line between using shorthands to describe personality traits of an individual vs. using them to embody an entire group of people, especially race, in a way that reduces them to only those characteristics. I think the challenge, especially in parcelling out racism in a movie or book, is to distinguish between the two.
Best,
Alice
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DividedSelf
Registered
User
(9/30/05 9:34 am)
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Re: Racism, etc.
Yes, I'm not sure stereotypes are necessarily the problem (in themselves). Stereotypes are everywhere, whether they're of ethnicity or culture. (White English stereotypes for instance range from comic to tedious, but probably aren't really damaging socially.) Sometimes they're an intrinsic part of a certain form, like funny fat and thin guys with bowler hats.
Ethical problems arise when the stereotype has developed from or echoes attitudes we want to change - because they're damaging in one way or another.
I guess the Oompa Loompas are pretty much a perfect encapsulation of the values of (the stereotypical) Victorian British old colonial.
If such values were absolutely dead and gone, I guess it would be possible to enjoy them as a comic fantasy. Trouble is these values are alive and well and living in the hearts of some extremely nasty and politically active people.
When stereotypes resonate with reality it gets dangerous.
Edited by: DividedSelf at: 9/30/05 9:35 am
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Veronica
Schanoes
Registered
User
(9/30/05 12:07 pm)
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Re: Racism, etc.
Quote:
Is there a specific reason why the Disney/racist connection?
I think the importance of Disney in studies like this is due to Disney's power to endure. While other film studios have been and continue to be perfectly dreadful with respect to racism, Disney's movies a) are directed at children and thus help to inculcate social prejudices at an early age and, more importantly, b) persist over time. Thus a historicist study of Disney's Peter Pan or Snow White, while absolutely necessary to a responsible paper, is not sufficient, because Snow White was not just a power cultural presence for the children of 1937, but also was ever-present for my mother's generation in the 1950s, as well as for mine in the 1980s, and again today. With the relatively recent development of VCRs and DVDs, more movies are able to have that kind of persistent effect, but prior to those, Disney animation movies were some of the few that were released over and over again, and thus were woven into the cultural fabric in a way that few other types of movies were. Nowadays, with the Disney Conglomerate From Hell, there's a huge market saturation with the movies, the channel, the costumes, the ice capades, etc. that continues to imbue Disney movies with influence far greater, in my opinion, than their contemporaries.
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Writerpatrick
Registered
User
(9/30/05 3:48 pm)
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Re: Racism, etc.
Walt Disney was accused of anti-semitism. It was quite a scandal at the time. This may have been a result of the power conflict between Disney's studios and the other studios which were founded by Jewish businessmen.
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DerekJ
Unregistered User
(9/30/05 4:35 pm)
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Re: Racism, etc.
Quote:
Walt Disney was accused of anti-semitism. It was quite a scandal at the time. This may have been a result of the power conflict between Disney's studios and the other studios which were founded by Jewish businessmen.
Actually, it was a bit of deliberately negative spin, during the time that Walt was refusing to bow to powerful outside union influences that were trying to organize the animators--
One of the minority animators speaks about the scandals on the "Walt: Man & the Myth" DVD documentary (rent
immediately
), and rushes to Walt's defense.
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bielie
Unregistered User
(10/1/05 11:38 am)
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Short People
Seriously, I have to object to the portrayal of short people by various authors and film makers as workaholics who burst into song at the slightest instigation. This is one of the most unfortunate stereotypes ever created and has condemmed many people who could have made positive contributions to society in other fields to menial labour in mines (or chocolate factories) with the contractual obligation to sing silly songs.
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cmoore0013
Unregistered User
(10/1/05 2:09 pm)
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Guidelines
I think parents should set certain guidelines. They should tell their children that they don't have to be blonde to be pretty or that they can be African American, Native American,or Asian and still be attractive. It just like if parents were to bring their kids to a violent action film or a scary movie. They should talk with their children and tell them what is real and what si not.
I think Disney has been very good to displaying other types of heros and heriones in their films as of lately. Mulan and every character in Aladdin are very different from the characers in Cinderella.
Actually, my Cinderella film(which is finnally complete, unlike Snow White) got a couple of harsh reviews by local video and children's critics because the stepsisters were African American and are viewed as evil, yet both are very attractive(unlike the Disney version). I had to fight off critisism and well as my actresses who thought it was the stupidest thing they had ever heard.
I think some people can blow small things up to gigantic excess.
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Veronica
Schanoes
Registered
User
(10/1/05 2:44 pm)
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Re: Guidelines
The difference is, bielie, that short people have not been condemned to work in mines and sing silly songs, whereas the incredibly cruel and violent treatment of black people by white people in the US has been justified by the use of racist ideologies often expressed in pop culture. Talking about stereotypes without talking about real-world power dynamics only gives half the picture.
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Princessterribel
Unregistered User
(10/2/05 3:25 am)
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Have we forgotten Prejudice?
were you just considering Prejudice in a racial sense or in general? If in General I would say that Beauty and the Beast is a rather good example of prejudice on a basic level. There is the Prejudice that because the beast looks fearsome and destructive people almost automatically consider him to be so despite Belle's protestations that he is 'really kind and gentle'.
This could be an example of Disney's working against commonplace prejudices that the prince exhibited when he turned against the old woman/fairy at the beginning of the story. The Prince was punished for his prejudice against the ugly and elderly as Gaston is for his arrogance and cruelty by his death.
In reply to a much older comment about Disney's stereotyping of Cinderella being blonde and therefore beautiful. I would say that this is something seen from the first known Cinderella story originating in China during the Tang Dynasty. The Cinderella type dictates that the Cinderella character only succeeds because she is Good and Beautiful...she must be both. What Disney therefore represents is the American perception of beauty at the time probably epitomized by Marilyn Monroe, a 'blonde bombshell'.
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